Space Battle
If the active system contains ships belonging to the active player and ships belonging to an opponent, a Space Battle must be fought. A Space Battle is fought over a consecutive number of combat rounds until only ships of one player remain (or the ships of both players have been simultaneously destroyed). PRE-COMBAT Before the actual Space Battle begins, players must resolve any pre-combat actions. The following is a list of possible pre-combat effects: Anti-Fighter Barrage Action Cards that state “Immediately before a space battle” or words to that effect Assault Cannons Creuss Racial Technology Dimensional Splicer Mentak ability Minister of War Naalu Racial Technology Psionic Relays First both sides roll for Anti-Fighter Barrage and remove casualties. Then remaining pre-combat effects are conducted simultaneously by the attacker and defender. '''Ships moving into the system using Naalu Psionic Relays do not get the benefit or harm from any pre-combat effects. ANTI-FIGHTER BARRAGE Before the first round of Space Battle, roll two dice for each Destroyer unit in the battle. For every result equal to or higher than the Destroyer's combat value (all combat values can be found on the unit table on every player's Race Sheet), the opponent must take one Fighter unit as an immediate casualty. Such eliminated Fighter units are removed immediately and placed back among a player's reinforcements; they do not receive return fire and will not participate in the upcoming Space Battle. A fleet containing no Fighter units is unaffected by pre-combat Destroyer fire. OTHER PRE-COMBAT EFFECTS The details for the other pre-combat effects can be found on the respective Action, Political and Technology Advances and the Mentak Race Sheet. '''THE SPACE BATTLE ROUND After finishing any "before combat" actions, continue to the actual combat. A Space Battle always follows the Space Battle Sequence. THE SPACE BATTLE SEQUENCE 1) Announce withdrawals/retreats 2) Roll combat dice 3) Remove casualties 4) Execute withdrawals/retreats After step 4, if both players still have ships remaining in the system, repeat the Space Battle Sequence until only one player has ships remaining, or all ships in the system have been destroyed. Below, each step of the Space Battle Sequence is described in detail: 1) ANNOUNCE WITHDRAWALS/RETREATS At this time, the attacker may announce a withdrawal and the defender may announce a retreat. Normally, withdrawals and retreats are executed after at least one combat round. The attacker first has the option to announce his withdrawal from battle. If the attacker chooses not to declare a withdrawal, then the defender may declare a retreat. Note that if the attacker does decide to withdraw, the defender may not retreat at all. Any actual withdrawals/retreats occur at the last step of the combat phase. This means that all Space Battles will have at least one round of combat. Declaring a withdrawal or a retreat, the player announces a target adjacent system that contains no enemy ships (it may contain ground units, Space Docks etc.). For a withdrawal, this system must have been previously activated by the withdrawing player (that is it contains the player’s Command Counter). The retreating player may target a system that he has previously activated or another system providing he has a Command Counter in his Strategy Allocation area. When announcing a retreat (or withdrawal), the player need not pay attention to his Fleet Supply in the system being retreated to. Any excess ships will be removed after the retreat (or withdrawal). 2) ROLL COMBAT DICE During this step, both players simultaneously roll combat dice for every one of their spaceships in the battle. Note that Dreadnoughts, War Suns and Flagships roll more than one combat die. For each result that is equal to or higher than the combat value of its ship, a "hit" is scored (all base combat values can be found on the unit table on a player’s Race Sheet). Players must remember the total number of successful hits as they move to the next step. Example: The attacking player has a fleet of three Cruisers and one Dreadnought. During the first battle round, he rolls for his attacking ships. He takes three dice for the Cruisers (Combat Value 7) and rolls a 2, 5, and 7 -- one hit. Then he takes two dice for his Dreadnought and rolls a 6 and a 4 -- one hit. The attacking player announces that he has inflicted a total of two hits on the defending fleet. The defending player has two Fighters (supported by a Space Dock in the system) and one Destroyer. He takes two dice for the Fighter units and rolls a 3 and a 5 -- both misses. Then he takes one die for his Destroyer and rolls a 0 (a 10) a hit. The defending player announces that he has inflicted one total hit on the attacking fleet. 3) REMOVE CASUALTIES Each player must now take a number of casualties equal to the number of hits scored by the opponent in step 2. First the attacking player removes his casualties. For every casualty, he must destroy one of his ships of his choice or damage one of his Dreadnoughts or War Suns (if a damaged Dreadnought receives a second hit or War Sun a third hit, it is destroyed). Destroyed ships are placed among a player's reinforcements, and become available for production once again. After the attacking player has removed all his casualties, the defending player must then remove his casualties. Note that whenever a player removes casualties in TI, the casualty is always determined by the affected player. Since Fighters are the cheapest unit to produce, they make effective "cannon fodder" and are thus typically among the first units to be chosen as casualties. Example: The defending player scored one hit. The attacking player then chooses to damage his Dreadnought (soaking up a casualty). The attacker scored a total of two hits. The defending player chooses to remove two Fighter units as casualties and places them back with his reinforcements. 4) EXECUTE WITHDRAWALS/RETREATS If the attacking player announced a withdrawal or the defending player announced a retreat during step 1 of the Space Battle Sequence, that player must now execute the withdrawal/retreat, following the rules below. A withdrawal or retreat is not allowed if, at this point in the battle, the opposing player has no units left in the system. Even if a player announced a withdrawal or retreat at the beginning of the combat round, if he has somehow managed to destroy all the opposing units, the withdrawal/retreat is cancelled and the units must remain in the system. The system withdrawn or retreated into was declared at the start of the space battle round. For a retreat, if the system was not already activated by the retreating player, he must now activate it with a Command Counter from his Strategy Allocation area. After a successful withdrawal or retreat, make sure that the withdrawing/retreating player is still in compliance with his Fleet Supply (see rules for Fleet Supply on page 37) and has sufficient Fighter capacity (see the Fighter unit’s description on page 59) in the new system. If not, he must immediately destroy the excess ships. END OF A SPACE BATTLE After the first Space Battle round is completed, if both players still have surviving ships in the system, another Space Battle round begins. This continues until only one player has ships in the system (or the ships of both players have been eliminated).